


got me like a loaded gun

by parcequelle



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Episode: s01e10 Prime Factors, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-30
Updated: 2018-06-30
Packaged: 2019-05-30 18:07:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15102137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parcequelle/pseuds/parcequelle
Summary: Kathryn and B'Elanna rebuild their working relationship, and something more, after the events of 'Prime Factors'.





	got me like a loaded gun

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has been in slow progress for about three years, and I am really glad to have finally finished it! Eternal thanks to Kay and Carmen for beta duties and general plot triage.

The night they leave Sikaris, armed with bitter disappointment and a burnt-out husk of space-folding technology, Kathryn doesn’t sleep. She delays going to bed, stays up in her ready room until her coffee is cold and her back is aching from too long bent over the terminal, and then wastes another hour sorting through PADDs in her quarters, authorising department requests that don’t need tending to for another week. It’s after 0200 by the time she sheds part of her uniform, but when she is standing before the mirror, half-heartedly examining the lines of stress and exhaustion etched into her too-pale face, she knows there’s no point: she turns away, refastens her jacket, pulls her hair into a rough ponytail and heads back out.

She takes the scenic route and winds her way through the decks, detouring past quiet crew quarters to avoid sickbay, the science lab, the airponics bay. By the time she’s passed the holodecks – considered going in as a distraction, decided against it – and found her way to Engineering, she can no longer delude herself that that wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind all along. She hesitates only briefly before she smooths down the front of her uniform and strides in, head held high. She is the captain, after all; she is entitled to wander the ship any time she pleases without explanation, including at 0200 when she should have been off-duty for six hours.

She can’t even pretend surprise at finding B’Elanna, lips pursed and eyes narrowed in deep concentration, running what looks like routine maintenance on the gel-packs. B’Elanna, so absorbed in her work that she doesn’t even look up. Kathryn stands there, silent and inappropriately self-conscious, for a full thirty seconds before B’Elanna finally registers her presence, and the expressions cycle so quickly across her face that it’s damned near comic: surprise, astonishment, nervousness, anger, and finally, the shuttered coldness of professionalism. No less than what Kathryn has asked of her; no less than what she expects.

‘Captain,’ B’Elanna says, nodding stiffly, ‘I’m sorry. I – I didn’t hear you come in.’

‘That’s – all right, Lieutenant. I was just…’ But she doesn’t finish, doesn’t know what to say. Not sleeping? Killing time? Trying to avoid thinking about what you did yesterday?

They stare at each other, awkwardness rising. Why had she thought it was a good idea to come down here?

Then, finally, Kathryn says, ‘Well, I’ll leave you to your work.’ Last week, she might have made a quip about B’Elanna working overtime, about the ship getting more rest than she does, but last week was different; now, instead, she just nods and turns to go. The doors have already swished open when B’Elanna’s voice stops her, soft and low, but it carries in the quiet of ship’s night.

‘Captain,’ she says, and it sounds like _wait_. It sounds like _please_. ‘Are you… are you busy right now?’

Kathryn shakes her head.

‘If you have a moment, would you like to give me a hand? My diagnostic turned up a misalignment in the warp plasma manifolds, and it’s a bit fiddly to handle alone.’

It’s at this moment that Kathryn realises they are truly alone in Engineering, that B’Elanna is running gamma shift solo. Kathryn frowns. ‘What happened to your team?’

‘I sent them to their quarters early,’ B’Elanna admits, looking away from her. ‘I can manage the work alone – well, almost all the work – and they needed the rest, after the last couple of days.’ Her face darkens, and she looks like she’s going to say more, but then she presses her lips together. ‘Just over here, Captain, if you don’t mind.’

Kathryn doesn’t; she would take an efficient few minutes of silent routine maintenance over stilted small talk any day. She’s still disappointed in B’Elanna, still angered at what she helped to do, but if a little shared elbow grease can smooth the road back to their only-recently-paved professional relationship, then so be it. No captain’s pride is worth a sacrifice as valuable as B’Elanna Torres.

She finds she’s even relieved to give over control for a while. There’s something soothingly familiar about sitting crouched in a Jeffries tube beside another competent, focused person, communicating only to pass over tools and provide extra hands when needed. The corrections are basic work, mindless and methodical, and Kathryn removes and replaces circuitry, holds panels at a more accessible angle, takes comfort in the resulting blankness of her thoughts.

When they’re done, Kathryn reseals the conduits and B’Elanna runs her tricorder over the open panel. After a moment, she looks up and announces, ‘Plasma flow steady, all manifolds functioning within normal parameters,’ and Kathryn smiles. 

B’Elanna smiles back, for a moment, and then seems to remember; realisation drops into her eyes, the smile drops from her face, and she clears her throat. ‘That was that, then.’ Her voice is too loud in the empty room.

‘I suppose so,’ Kathryn says. ‘Unless… unless there was something else you needed help with? I mean, since I’m here?’

B’Elanna hides her emotions about as well as Kathryn hides her addiction to coffee, but the surprise morphs into acceptance – perhaps even relief, if Kathryn is reading her correctly – and she nods. ‘If you can spare the time, Captain, that would be… nice. We have had one or two reports of power fluctuations in Holodeck Two…’

*

She comes back from the holodeck, fluctuations no more, at 0455 hours. At 0640, the computer beeps its unwelcome way into her consciousness. She feels gritty and sluggish, the result of pulling an all-nighter when she’s no longer twenty-one and doesn’t even have a ship-wide crisis as an excuse; when Chakotay knocks on her door to fetch her for their weekly breakfast date, he just raises an eyebrow.

‘Not a word,’ she grumbles, but that just makes him crack a smile.

‘Find a good book in the cultural database?’ he teases.

‘Something like that. Now, don’t talk to me until I’ve had a cup of coffee, and add another two hours to that if it’s Neelix’s coffee “substitute”.’

He laughs. ‘Understood.’

To the benefit of the entire crew and possibly the quadrant at large, she does still have enough replicator rations for coffee. They bypass the mess hall entirely, crowded with sleepy-eyed, pre-alpha shift crewmen, and head instead up to the ready room, where Chakotay surprises her with replicated eggs and mushrooms, toast and jam. She eyes the spread when he sets it before her, brow raised. ‘What’s all this?’

His cheek dimples as he carefully sets a napkin across his lap. ‘Officially? I can’t tell you. Unofficially, I… may have acquired some extra rations this week.’

Coffee poised at her lips, Kathryn leans forward. ‘Acquired?’

‘Through means legal and in accordance with Starfleet regulations, of course.’

She can’t help laughing at his failed earnestness. ‘Of course. Now, just tell me—’

The door to the ready room chimes and Kathryn rolls her eyes good-naturedly, expecting Neelix with a tray of something exotic. ‘Come.’

But it isn’t Neelix; it’s B’Elanna. Kathryn blinks once, blinks away her surprise, and manages a smile. ‘Good morning, Lieutenant,’ she says, after a pause that lasts a split-second too long. ‘What can I do for you?’

‘Good morning, Captain,’ B’Elanna says, then, ‘Commander.’ Chakotay nods. B’Elanna looks between them, to the table, and says, ‘I can come back later, if you—’

‘It’s all right,’ Kathryn says. Why does B’Elanna look nervous? Why does Kathryn _feel_ nervous? ‘Go ahead.’

B’Elanna… is B’Elanna blushing?

‘I, uh, I just wanted to let you know, Captain, that your idea about the phase variance in the deflector was right on the mark. I have Seska correcting it now.’

The phase variance – the last thing they’d worked on before they broke for the evening, or rather the morning, after B’Elanna had yawned so widely her jaw had cracked. Kathryn had hypothesised the phase variance when she was already half-asleep, and she hadn’t given it any thought beyond that; it was thoughtful of B’Elanna to come to tell her that she’d been correct. Thoughtful but unnecessary. ‘That’s good news, Lieutenant. Well done.’ B’Elanna nods, hovering; Kathryn frowns. ‘Was there something else?’

B’Elanna looks as though she might say something, her eyes still on Kathryn’s, but then she shakes her head. ‘That was all, Captain. I’ll leave you to it. Commander,’ she says again, nodding at them both.

‘Dismissed,’ Kathryn says, faintly, but B’Elanna is already halfway out the door.

When they are alone again, Kathryn looks over to find Chakotay studying her. She busies herself with a bite of rapidly-cooling eggs. ‘What?’

Chakotay looks back at the door, back at her; she can almost hear the cogs working in his brain. ‘Interesting.’

‘What?’ she demands again.

This time he just gives her an infuriating grin. ‘Nothing,’ he says. He gestures down at her food. ‘Don’t let it get cold.’

*

She meets B’Elanna in Engineering the following night, and then two nights after that and two nights after that. The whole time, Chakotay’s calculating expression is buzzing somewhere in the back of her mind, and she asks herself what he’s seeing that she isn’t. What she’s missed.

* 

The tenth time – not that she’s counting – Kathryn’s nightly wanderings take her to Stellar Cartography, and it’s there that B’Elanna finds her. She is running a diagnostic just for the hell of it, passing the time by reading over several months’ worth of star charts, starting all the way back at the Array. When the doors slide open and she feels the air shift as someone steps through, Kathryn doesn’t have to guess.

‘Looking for something in particular?’ B’Elanna asks softly, in lieu of a greeting.

Kathryn turns, then, and gives her half a smile. ‘I’m not quite sure yet. I’m hoping I’ll know when I find it.’

B’Elanna walks over, eyes the console beside her, adjusts the scan parameters and then quickly pulls her hand back. ‘I’m sorry, Captain, I didn’t mean to—’

‘It’s all right.’ Kathryn reaches a hand out to touch her arm the way she would do with any other crewmember, on any other day, but something stops her and she makes a fist instead. Lets it fall. ‘I welcome your input.’

‘I shouldn’t really meddle at all,’ B’Elanna mutters, ‘or I’ll catch hell from the Delaney sisters.’ At Kathryn’s raised eyebrow, she says, ‘It’s not just me, I don’t think. They can be a little territorial. Doesn’t stop them from being great at their jobs.’

‘Ah,’ Kathryn says. ‘Well, if you run into trouble, you can feel free to blame it on me.’

‘Captain?’

Kathryn spreads her hands. ‘There’s hardly a better excuse than having authorisation from on high, hmm?’

B’Elanna smiles in response, taps a few keys, and then turns her back on the console. She holds herself tensely, arms folded across her chest. Kathryn has been watching her a few moments, considering the wisdom of breaking the silence, when B’Elanna sighs and says, ‘I just… I want you to know, Captain, that I’m sorry.’

Kathryn doesn’t have to ask what she’s referring to; the sudden tightness in her chest has taken care of that, right along with the feeling that the artificial gravity in the room has just failed.

‘I didn’t say it,’ B’Elanna goes on, when Kathryn doesn’t, can’t respond. It’s all so fresh, she thinks; it’s been two weeks, almost three, but it still feels too soon to be having this conversation. She isn’t sure what to make of B’Elanna’s dark, intense expression, her uncharacteristically heavy words. ‘Maybe it’s selfish of me, but I’ve been playing it over and over again and I realised I – I told you I would take responsibility and I have, I do, but I just… well, I wanted to apologise.’ She looks down at her feet, toes at the floor with one scuffed boot. ‘For what it’s worth.’

She doesn’t look up, doesn’t brave it, and when Kathryn moves closer to her and extends two fingers to tilt up her chin, B’Elanna’s eyes are clouded, but she holds her gaze. She’s so proud, so tough – so lovely – that it tugs at Kathryn's heart, and she is hit with a wave of affection so strong that it drops her burning fingers from B’Elanna’s skin. She tries to make up for it by telling her, as seriously as she can, ‘It’s worth something, B’Elanna. It’s worth a lot.’ She shakes her head. ‘I was disappointed, and you know that. But I know that you don’t take the situation lightly, and I… do believe that you are sorry.’ She gives her a half-smile. ‘For what it’s worth.’

B’Elanna gives her a tight, quick nod and turns away, and Kathryn is grateful for the opportunity to compose herself unobserved. She is just wondering how to disentangle her emotions from this unexpectedly charged conversation when the console behind B’Elanna starts beeping an alert. Kathryn goes to look over her shoulder – careful not to touch, though she can feel the warmth radiating from B’Elanna’s body – and says, ‘Oh,’ just as B’Elanna says, ‘Look at that.’

‘I’ll get my engineering toolkit,’ B’Elanna says, and Kathryn sets to work analysing the data.

*

After that, it becomes something more than a habit; after that, it becomes one of the things that Kathryn looks forward to most: the nights she can’t sleep; the places she goes; the person she goes to. One way or another, they always find each other, and they always spend a handful of quiet, productive hours side by side. They manage it three nights a week for almost two months before people who aren’t Chakotay start to notice.

The first is Joe Carey.

Kathryn is sitting in her ready room at the end of alpha shift when Lieutenant Carey comms through and asks to speak with her. She is surprised – she usually deals with department heads, and the crew have accepted Chakotay as the officer in charge of duty rosters and other personnel issues – but she agrees and Carey turns up ten minutes later, eyes tight with concern.

He accepts a cup of Tarkalian tea and sits down across from her, sipping. After a few moments of silence, Kathryn leans forward and asks, as gently as she can, ‘What can I do for you, Mr Carey?’

‘For me? Oh, I’m fine, Captain.’ Another sip; Kathryn raises an eyebrow. Carey swallows, sets down his cup. ‘I’m here about Lieutenant Torres.’

Kathryn frowns. ‘I was given to understand that relations between Starfleet and the former Maquis were relatively stable at the moment,’ she says, ‘even down in Engineering. Was that incorrect?’

‘What? No, Captain, not at all! No, I’m not here to complain about Lieutenant Torres; I’m here because I’m _worried_ about her.’

‘Worried,’ Kathryn echoes. She leans back in her chair, hopes the relief that this isn’t another petty intra-departmental dispute doesn’t show on her face. ‘Why is that?’

Now Carey shifts, looks a little uncomfortable. ‘Please understand I don’t mean this as an accusation, Captain. I’m sure the lieutenant would be… unhappy, to say the least, if she knew I were mentioning it, but – well, I guess I’ve just got to come out and say it. I’m worried she’s working too much.’ He hands a PADD across the desk, and when she skims it, Kathryn finds a repair log, complete with instance after instance of B’Elanna’s authorisation code alongside their corresponding time and date stamps. Carey gestures at them, leaning forward. ‘Do you see the times? 0204, 0323, 0417 – I double-checked the duty rosters, and there are stardates listed here when I know for a fact that Lieutenant Torres worked alpha or beta shift. On some days, she even worked both! She can’t have been sleeping more than two, maybe three hours a night.’

He shakes his head and drains his tea while Kathryn stares down at the list, guilt and shame and a strange feeling of anticipation pulsing hot in her chest. She feels, incongruously, the way she did when she was sixteen, when she found her father’s hidden stash of Romulan ale and spent a month terrified he would realise some was missing. ‘…how she can go on in this way,’ Carey is saying, and she forces her attention back to him, to this good, kind man who is showing genuine concern for a woman who not so long ago broke his nose. ‘I respect her as an engineer, Captain, I truly do. I’d almost go so far as to say I like her. This isn’t… I don’t want for a moment to discredit her, or to throw her authority into question. How could I?’ He gestures at the PADD, limp in Kathryn’s warm hands. ‘Even at 0400 hours, after a double shift at the core, she still catches things that might elude me on a good day. She’s brilliant.’

‘Yes,’ Kathryn murmurs, her eyes on the column of numbers. ‘That she is.’

Carey sighs, and with it seems to expel some of the tension he’s been holding since he walked in. ‘Well, that’s all I wanted to say. I know Lieutenant Torres thinks very highly of you, Captain; I thought perhaps you might be able to speak to her, as someone who couldn’t be seen to have an agenda. I just don’t want her to work herself into the ground, that’s all. Klingon blood goes a long way, but it doesn’t make her superhuman.’

‘No, indeed. Thank you, Mr Carey. I will be sure to address this.’ She stands and walks around the desk to shake his hand. ‘I’m glad you came to me, Lieutenant. Your discretion is to be commended, as is your concern.’ She doesn’t ask why he didn’t go to Chakotay, though she’s tempted; she just smiles. ‘Dismissed.’

‘Thank you, Captain. Have a good evening,’ he says, and leaves, apparently satisfied.

Kathryn stays in her ready room for a long, long time. When she finally goes down to her quarters, she changes into her nightgown and reads a real paper book of Irish poetry, cover to cover, as the hours on the chrono tick by.

*

For the next six days, _Voyager_ cruises through regular, boring space at warp seven and encounters nothing but regular, boring stars. Kathryn hides out in her ready room, reading reports, barking orders to the unsuspecting ensign at the conn that she should only be disturbed in an emergency. She sets herself down with a pot of coffee – a true indulgence, but one she needs today if she ever did – and catches up on backlog: Tuvok’s weekly efficiency report from Security/Tactical; Neelix’s monthly suggestion list on How to Improve Morale; the ever-growing pile of the Doctor’s complaints.

When, on the fifth day, Chakotay uses his emergency override to gain access to the room, she stands up and meets him with a glare. ‘Commander,’ she says, icy, ‘was something about the words “only in an emergency” unclear to you?’

Chakotay has come prepared: he actually brandishes a small white square of cloth, and Kathryn narrows her eyes at him harder to stop herself smiling. ‘May I come in?’ he asks – redundantly, of course – but he hasn’t dared venture any farther into the room, so at least he’s pretending respect. ‘Will this suffice, or should I have brought an olive branch, too? Or perhaps a dove?’

She rolls her eyes but waves him in. ‘Whatever it is, make it quick. I’m busy.’

‘I’m sure you are,’ he says. He even manages to say it with a straight face. He walks over to the replicator, puts the square of cloth into it and watches it disappear. Then he turns back to her, hands on his hips, and asks, ‘What’s going on between you and B’Elanna?’

She opens her mouth. Closes it again. Feels rage, red and blistering, boiling inside her. ‘Of all the inappropriate, impertinent—’

‘—I meant,’ Chakotay interrupts gently, with a tug of a smile that only incenses Kathryn all the more, ‘did you fight? Or are you still fighting? I know what happened back on Sikaris; she told me. I had the impression you’d resolved your difficulties.’ He pauses, searching her face, but she sets her expression; she won’t make this easy on him, oh no. ‘Was I wrong?’

‘Lieutenant Torres and I have discussed the matter. I believe we have reached an understanding.’

‘Right,’ says Chakotay. He tilts his head, studying her. ‘So why did she nearly rip my head off today when I asked her about it? And why did Vorik just narrowly miss getting a hyperspanner to the skull?’

Kathryn stares at him. That had happened? Today? She shrugs and says, ‘Stress.’

‘When we’ve been travelling unimpeded at optimal speed for days and the warp core is running at peak efficiency? I’m sorry, Captain, I know I’m bordering on mutiny myself, here—’

‘—you’ve got that right—’

‘—but you’re going to have to do better than that.’ Chakotay holds up a hand and starts ticking points off his fingers. ‘You and B’Elanna fight and then you make up. Everything runs smoothly for weeks. B’Elanna seems tireder than usual, maybe a little overworked, but happier than I’ve ever known her; there are even rumours that have her humming in the mess hall.’

Kathryn frowns, tries, ‘Maybe she likes the food?’

Chakotay gives her a disbelieving look and she sighs.

‘Then,’ he goes on, ‘at the same time, just as we hit the equivalent of an interstellar highway, you disappear for days and B’Elanna goes back to throwing tools and shouting at everyone she sees.’ His expression softens, and he says, quieter, ‘I think you can probably see how I made the connection.’

His face is so open, so honest, that she feels the fight drain out of her and sinks back against her desk, reaches around to rub at the spot that’s been throbbing in her neck for about six days. ‘All right, all right, I admit it: there may have been a… a situation. But if you breathe a word of this to anyone outside this room, I swear, Chakotay, I will not think twice before tossing you out an airlock with the Leola root.’

‘You have my word, Captain,’ he says. ‘This is what a first officer is for.’

Perhaps he’s right; perhaps he is the one to speak to about it. He’s surely the only one who’s put it together, the only one brave enough to phrase his initial question in a way that didn’t so much imply an emotionally compromising predicament as shout it from the proverbial rooftop.

‘All right,’ she says again, tiredly. ‘I suppose you’d better sit down.’

Chakotay sits quietly and listens, then listens some more. Then he thinks; sips his tea; thinks some more. After a very, very long time has passed – possibly months – and Kathryn has damned near worn a hole in her Starfleet-issue boots with her pacing, he looks up and says, ‘You should talk to her.’

Hands on her hips, she stops pacing. Glares. ‘That’s it?’

‘Well, that’s the start. This change in your arrangement has made her as unhappy as it’s made you, and neither the two of you nor the rest of the crew can continue to work around such low morale. What would happen if there were a crisis? If the Kazon or the Vidiians were to attack right now? We can’t have a captain and a chief engineer who refuse to speak to each other. We just can’t.’

‘It wouldn’t come to that,’ Kathryn murmurs. ‘If there were a crisis, then we would push through it. We’re both professionals.’

‘At work, I have no doubt about it. At personal—’ he stops when he sees her expression. ‘If this were a different situation,’ he tries, ‘it would appear to any outsider that you had ended a romantic engagement with her entirely without warning or explanation.’

She stares at him again, astonished and almost impressed by his brazenness. 

‘I know that isn’t the case here,’ he continues, ‘but I hope you can understand where I’m coming from.’

She can, of course; that’s one reason he’s such a pain. Kathryn lets out a long, deep sigh and nods slowly. ‘I’ll take it under advisement,’ she says. ‘Thank you for your… candour, Mr Chakotay.’

‘I hope I didn’t step too far out of line,’ he says, heading for the doors. ‘How close was I?’

She thinks about it a moment and then holds up a thumb and forefinger, half an inch of space between them. Chakotay grins.

*

She thinks about just going to find her, about just turning up in Engineering when she knows B’Elanna’s on shift and pretending like nothing happened, but she doesn’t. Instead, she sits in her quarters with the lights dimmed low, re-reading the same two sentences for twenty minutes straight before she swears at herself and taps her commbadge. ‘Janeway to Torres.’

A pause, a breath, and then: ‘Torres here.’ Clipped and cool. Fair.

‘Do you have a moment to talk, Lieutenant?’ There is a rattle and a whistle from the other end of the line; Kathryn frowns. ‘Is this a bad time?’

‘No, I was just venting the plasma injectors. Captain.’ Another pause. ‘Is ten minutes all right?’

‘Fine,’ Kathryn says. She realises she hasn’t given her any information, realises she can’t very well ask her to meet in the captain’s quarters – can she? In a rush, cheeks heating, she says, ‘Stellar Cartography. Janeway out.’ Then, ‘Computer, what is the current occupancy of Stellar Cartography?’

‘There are no crewmembers currently in Stellar Cartography.’

‘Is that about to change?’

‘Please re-state query.’

‘Oh, forget it.’ She tosses her PADD aside, rolls her neck, and hopes to whatever star is listening that she isn’t making a terrible mistake.

She arrives in fourteen minutes, and Stellar Cartography is still empty. Kathryn thinks about leaving, doubling back around the deck to buy herself some time, and then rolls her eyes. She reminds herself of all the situations she’s been in that have warranted greater nervousness than this, an appointment to meet her chief engineer late at night, but finds the comparison sorely lacking. Her nerves are jangling, she’s back to pacing, and she is about to bark at the computer for B’Elanna’s location when the doors slide open and there she is, dark-eyed and stiff-backed, her hair beginning to frizz and fall into her eyes. She looks beautiful, Kathryn thinks, dumbly. It’s as though the thought comes from somewhere outside her consciousness, but as soon as it’s lodged there, she knows it’s her own. That it’s been there for a while, buried inside her, just waiting for an opportunity to rise.

They stand there, three yards between them, staring at one another until the tension becomes unbearable and Kathryn clears her throat. She is the one who instigated this meeting, after all; she is the one whose avoidance behaviour made it necessary. ‘Thank you for coming, Lieutenant,’ she finally says.

‘You’re the captain,’ B’Elanna says.

‘I suppose I deserved that,’ Kathryn murmurs, and B’Elanna’s eyes soften, just a bit. The doors close behind her, and she seems only then to realise that she’s still standing directly in front of them; she takes a few steps forward until she can lean against a nearby bulkhead. It leaves some space between them, but not so much that Kathryn feels like she has to shout across the room. She leans against the console behind her, hands clasped in front. ‘I was hoping we could discuss the situation,’ she says.

B’Elanna, to her relief, just shrugs. ‘I’m here,’ she says.

‘First of all, I wanted to apologise for my behaviour toward you in recent weeks.’

B’Elanna’s eyes narrow. ‘Do you mean when you came down to Engineering every other night to help me, or when you started ignoring me completely? Because how you want to treat me is your prerogative, Captain. I am first and foremost a member of your senior staff. If you want to help me out on gamma shift, fine. If you don’t want to, fine. I can’t stop you either way and I’m not going to try.’

Well, Kathryn thinks, resisting the urge to rub at her temples. This could have gone better. She is silent for several moments, and then says, ‘I had a visitor in my ready room two weeks ago.’

B’Elanna blinks. ‘Oh?’

‘Yes,’ Kathryn says. She holds B’Elanna’s gaze steady. ‘Lieutenant Carey.’

B’Elanna shifts her weight, slides her eyes away. ‘Oh. I suppose he still isn’t too happy about being passed up for promotion.’

‘No, that wasn’t it. B’Elanna, he came about you. Because he was worried.’ She shakes her head, leans more heavily against the console behind her. ‘He brought me this list,’ she says, almost chuckling. ‘Evidence, really, of your activities during gamma shift over the last two months. Time and date stamps from the repair logs.’

Now B’Elanna huffs out a laugh. ‘And what did you tell him?’

‘That I would address it,’ she says. ‘What else could I tell him? He was so righteous and concerned about you overworking yourself, and I was right there beside you, condoning it all.’

B’Elanna is watching her, now, brow furrowed. ‘I’m afraid I don’t understand why it’s such a problem, Captain. I might work over hours, but I can still do my job. I can still concentrate. My night repairs have no effect on any aspect of my daily life, and they certainly haven’t affected any of my relationships with my…’ but she trails off, seems to realise that she can’t finish that sentence, and says, ‘Oh,’ for the third time.

Kathryn nods, smiles wry. ‘So you see.’ She walks over to where B’Elanna is still standing against the bulkhead, stops a foot before her. ‘Once it was brought to my attention that your staff were worried about you, I… realised we couldn’t go on as before. It was irresponsible of me as a captain and as a – a friend, to allow you to pull so many hours off the clock. Every member of this crew needs their rest to function properly. That is especially relevant to those who work as hard as you do.’

‘I hope you’ll excuse me for saying this, Captain, but – pot-kettle?’

B’Elanna is almost smirking as she says it, and Kathryn rolls her eyes, good-natured. ‘Yes, well. Doesn’t that just qualify me all the more to dress you down?’

B’Elanna’s lips twitch and her eyes flicker down Kathryn’s body and then back up, quick but unmistakable. It catches Kathryn off guard, the blatant, unexpected flirtatiousness of it, and she is horrified to find herself blushing – caught off guard and _pleased_ about it. Flattered.

B’Elanna smirks for real, and Kathryn clears her throat. ‘Well,’ she says again. ‘Yes.’

What was she saying?

Emboldened by her response, B’Elanna steps closer still. When she stops, they are almost nose-to-nose. Kathryn doesn’t move away. ‘You know what I think?’ B’Elanna asks.

‘What’s that?’ Kathryn berates her gaze for trying to wander down to B’Elanna’s lips.

‘I think that we weren’t doing anything wrong. We both happen to be night owls; we both work well when other people are sleeping. We do well in the quiet, with no distractions. We’re a great team.’ Kathryn has to hum her assent at that. ‘And, to be frank, if we’re both going to have trouble sleeping anyway, who’s to say we shouldn’t use the time productively? Out here, you have to be captain all the time. You don’t have the luxury of transporting home after a long mission, or taking shore leave after a few hard weeks. Do you sleep better?’

Kathryn does look at her lips, this time, distracted by the way her tongue sweeps across them. ‘Better?’ she asks.

‘After we work in Engineering at night?’

‘Yes,’ she admits, before she can consider prevarication.

‘Then the way I see it, it’s actually helping your efficiency. Two or three hours of solid sleep have to be better than four or five hours where you wake up every twenty minutes.’

‘I knew I shouldn’t have told you about that,’ Kathryn mutters.

B’Elanna taps a finger against her own lip and smirks. ‘Your secret’s safe with me.’

The desire to kiss her pushes through Kathryn’s body like the pulse of a warp core, and it is that abrupt realisation that makes her take a step back, ball her hands into fists. B’Elanna seems to understand; instead of looking offended or disappointed, she just smiles, cocks her head to the side. The moment has passed, but its aftereffects are still lingering warm between them. ‘Well, thank you, Captain,’ she says, to the thickened air. ‘For the conversation.’

‘You too, Lieutenant.’ Kathryn nods, sliding her professional mask back into place, albeit with effort. ‘I’ll see you at the briefing tomorrow. 0800 hours.’

‘Yes,’ B’Elanna says. She heads towards the door, then turns back to say, ‘Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight, B’Elanna.’

‘And If I may…’

‘Yes?’

‘You haven’t done anything wrong, Captain. I hope you’ll remember that.’

It’s brazen, out of line, even, but the tone in which it’s delivered is careful. Is one of respect. Kathryn just nods, a dismissal that B’Elanna accepts, and Kathryn remains in the empty, quiet lab long after she’s gone, the words spinning around and around her mind.

_You haven’t done anything wrong._

But when she examines her shallow breath, her tingling fingers, her pounding heart, she knows for certain that she has.

*

After that, things go back to normal, or at least as normal as they ever have been. Kathryn stops hiding out in her ready room; B’Elanna stops throwing tools (at least as far as the reports seem to indicate); the two of them revert to an acceptable working relationship.

Chakotay, wisely, doesn’t try to draw it out of her. She catches him watching her, occasionally, his searching eyes moving between her and B’Elanna, but he never tells her what he’s thinking and she never asks. She does sometimes think she sees him smirking, though, somewhere in the periphery of her vision. 

B’Elanna sits adjacent to her in senior staff meetings and answers her questions, throws in ideas, rolls her eyes at Tom’s jokes – it’s exactly as it always was, yet completely different. Because there is also the way that B’Elanna holds Kathryn’s gaze for a little bit longer than usual after they’ve discussed some point of procedure. There is the way that Kathryn sometimes looks over to find B’Elanna has been studying her with a dark, intense look in her eyes, a look that makes Kathryn’s heart stutter and her words jumble up in her mouth. There is the way that, though Kathryn makes the effort to avoid Engineering, to avoid the late-night intimacy of working shoulder-to-shoulder – heads bent close, exchanging tools between lingering fingers – they keep winding up alone together. Moths to the flame.

*

Tonight, it’s ironic: Kathryn, in a desperate effort to go anywhere but to Engineering, heads instead up to the galley. She is guiltily relieved to discover that Neelix has already left for the night, and has just replicated a cup of coffee to keep her company when she hears someone laugh, disbelieving, from the viewport.

‘Fancy meeting you here, Captain,’ B’Elanna says.

Kathryn walks over and takes the seat opposite her, shakes her head on a laugh of her own. ‘Fancy that. What are you doing here?’

‘It’s a big ship, Captain.’ There’s the title again, though it does more harm than good when she says it like that, low and deep and full of night-time promise. ‘So probably the same thing you are.’

‘Touché.’ Kathryn takes a sip of too-hot coffee and swallows it down hard. ‘Who’s in Engineering?’

‘Ensign Vorik. He’s running a diagnostic on the environmental controls.’

‘And he didn’t want help?’

B’Elanna shrugs, takes a sip from her own cup. ‘It’s a one person job, and you know how pointless it is to try to convince a Vulcan to give up his duty shift, even for his commanding officer.’

‘So what you’re saying is you got kicked out of your engine room.’

B’Elanna scowls. ‘Something like that.’

Kathryn leans over and pats her comfortingly on the arm. ‘If it’s any consolation, I’ve been there. You wouldn’t believe the number of times Tuvok has as good as manhandled me off my own bridge.’

‘That is a bit of a consolation, actually. At least I know I don’t have to take it personally.’

Kathryn laughs, and they watch each other, warm and charged, the light from the passing stars streaking wild across B’Elanna’s lovely face. ‘What are you—’ B’Elanna starts, at the same time Kathryn says, ‘I might have a—’

B’Elanna makes an elaborate gesture. ‘Please, Captain.’

Kathryn rolls her eyes at the formality, at the twinkle in B’Elanna’s eyes, and goes on before she can stop herself. ‘It just occurred to me that I might have a project for you,’ she says. ‘If you really are looking for something to do.’

B’Elanna leans forward, instantly curious. ‘And what might that be?’

‘I’ve been meaning to report it but I just keep forgetting. My sonic shower has been playing up – the sonics work, but weakly, and the real water setting only gives me a drizzle. I haven’t had time to do anything about it myself. Would you like to—’

But B’Elanna is already nodding, standing, returning their empty cups to the replicator. ‘Let’s go take a look.’

Kathryn takes it as a yes.

*

About seven seconds after she has prised open the shower panel and peered inside it, B’Elanna pulls back and says, ‘I see the problem. There’s a misalignment in the sonic generator.’

Kathryn huffs. ‘Now why didn’t I pick that up?’

B’Elanna looks back at her, dark eyes dancing, and shifts aside in the stall to make room. She gestures to the circuitry. ‘Have a look for yourself.’

‘Ah,’ Kathryn says, after a moment of consideration. ‘The acoustic inverter coupling.’

Now B’Elanna grins. ‘Exactly. It’s tricky to catch if you aren’t looking for it.’

She pulls a decoupler and a phase modulator out of the toolkit propped on the sink and gets to work. She has almost finished the correction, Kathryn watching silent and appreciative over her shoulder, when she seems to register Kathryn’s gaze and looks up. Their eyes meet. Kathryn thinks she should say something, do something to diffuse the tension, but B’Elanna’s eyes are so bright, so deep, that she can only swallow. She sees those eyes track the movement of her throat; B’Elanna’s hand, still holding the modulator to the open panel, falls to her side. Then B’Elanna swallows, too, and it’s that sight – the awareness, the anticipation – that unravels the few remaining threads of Kathryn’s self-control.

‘B’Elanna,’ she murmurs. How had she not thought this through? After weeks and weeks of avoiding it, she has managed, quite without thinking, to not only invite B’Elanna into her quarters, but through her bedroom, into her bathroom, to stand beside her in a narrow space. In the middle of the night. Voluntarily.

Or maybe she was thinking.

B’Elanna licks her lips, and something hot and deep inside Kathryn starts to throb. Her voice is rough and bordering on desperate when she says, ‘I need… I can’t…’ and then breaks off, frustrated and flushed.

Kathryn, nodding, reaches out to grip her wrist, for better or worse. ‘I know, B’Elanna. Me too.’

B’Elanna’s eyes widen. ‘Then I, I should go,’ she says. ‘Before this – before we…’ she shakes her head and lets out a sound that is almost a growl. ‘Knowing that you want this too, Captain, I… I’m not sure how much longer I can stay here and… not act.’ It seems difficult for her to get the words out; she is gripping the decoupler so tightly that her skin is white at the knuckle.

‘I’m sorry,’ Kathryn says, and B’Elanna laughs, harsh but not cruel.

‘Don’t be sorry.’ Her wild eyes are raking over Kathryn’s, down her face and neck and back up again, communicating more than words ever could, and Kathryn feels stripped and wanted and hot in the very best of ways. She _aches_. ‘Just tell me to go. If you want me to go, tell me… tell me now.’

Kathryn doesn’t. B’Elanna lips are wet from where she’s run her tongue across them, her cheeks pink; it’s all Kathryn can do not to push her against the wall of the broken shower and put them both our of their misery. She closes her eyes on that image, picture perfect and thoroughly unhelpful in her mind, and shakes her head. She has to be the strong one, here; it is her responsibility to resist this, to make the grasp for logic; to be the captain, the elder, the more experienced.

She lists these points to herself over and over, these excellent points, even as she finds herself taking a deliberate step closer so that her uniform is brushing B’Elanna’s. She lists them as she extends her hands to B’Elanna’s and takes first one tool and then the other, reaching around her – B’Elanna’s quickening breath on her ear as she does – to set them aside. She even lists them, merrily, as she lifts her hand to B’Elanna’s face and cradles her chin in three fingers, holding her eyes, allowing her time to resist. 

There is no resistance. Kathryn has only a moment to register and return B’Elanna’s grin before B’Elanna’s arms slide around Kathryn’s waist and full lips find hers. She feels the taut muscle of B’Elanna’s body pressing her into the wall of the shower, her fantasy of moments earlier in perfect reverse. Kathryn kisses her hotly, matching B’Elanna’s pressure and speed, matching the guttural groans she releases when Kathryn’s fingers knead into her skull, when her fingernails scratch down her neck. Kathryn opens her mouth to B’Elanna’s tongue, feels herself melting into the wall that supports her, and responds as well as she’s able with liquid bones.

B’Elanna is a multitasker by nature, and makes short work of divesting Kathryn of her outer layer even as her mouth travels diligently down Kathryn’s neck, nipping and licking a line across to her pulse-point before Kathryn gasps and tilts her head back. ‘No marks,’ she manages, her voice rough, and when B’Elanna hums her assent, Kathryn adds, ‘at least not where I can see them,’ and B’Elanna’s laugh vibrates against her skin.

It’s only when B’Elanna’s fingers find their way beneath the rucked hem of Kathryn’s grey turtleneck, warm and sure and glorious, that the reality of the situation comes crashing back to her and she gasps, covers B’Elanna’s hands with her own to still them. ‘B’Elanna,’ she rasps, ‘B’Elanna, we have to stop.’

And B’Elanna does. Though her pupils are blown and her lips kiss-red, her chest heaving visibly, she draws back as soon as Kathryn says it, leans up against the opposite wall of the shower as they watch each other, heavy breath and too much space between them. After a moment, B’Elanna bursts into near-hysterical laughter, a hand covering her mouth. ‘Kahless,’ she manages, ‘you’re my Captain. I can’t believe I just... I’m going to spend the next seventy years in the brig.’

Kathryn wants to snap at her, to say something cutting to draw attention to the seriousness of their transgression, but B’Elanna’s laughter takes the wind from her sails, and B’Elanna’s words collapse them completely. ‘No,’ Kathryn says. She doesn’t risk stepping closer, but she stares hard at B’Elanna until she finally dares to meet her eyes. ‘No,’ she says again. ‘Wipe that thought from your mind right now.’

Kathryn’s sincerity infects her; B’Elanna drops her hand and composes herself, arms crossed over her chest. She is only wearing her tank top, and the posture does nothing to hide her toned, muscular arms and her golden skin. Kathryn shifts her eyes back to her face, but it’s too late; she’s been caught. B’Elanna has the grace not to mention it when Kathryn says, quietly, ‘What just happened was inappropriate. It was unprofessional and it was selfish, and I’m sorry. I should never have allowed it to happen, but you must rest assured that I do not hold you responsible, and you will not be punished for it.’ She swallows. ‘You are my subordinate, I am in a position of power over you, and I took advantage of you just now. I hope you can forgive me. If you want to file a formal complaint with Lieutenant Tuvok, I will understand.’

B’Elanna is staring at her. Kathryn holds her gaze, her heart tense, and then B’Elanna rolls her eyes and says, ‘Oh, please.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘With all due respect, Captain, stop acting like you just swallowed the officers’ manual. You might be my superior officer, but you didn’t take advantage of me. I was there, remember? And I’m pretty sure I kissed you.’ She looks pointedly at Kathryn’s lips, and Kathryn swallows again. ‘We definitely kissed each other. So don’t apologise for being unprofessional, and don’t tell me to report you for doing something we both wanted.’ She sniffs. ‘If anything, you should apologise for implying I wasn’t a fully consenting participant.’

A few long moments pass as Kathryn processes that, torn between the equal desires of calling B’Elanna out on her straight-talking honesty and kissing her for it. She has enough self-control not to do the latter, though the look in B’Elanna’s eyes suggests she realises the struggle was there. ‘I’m sorry,’ she finally says. ‘You’re right. I know you would have said something if you hadn’t felt comfortable with my… attentions, and I shouldn’t have implied otherwise. I will apologise for that.’

B’Elanna nods.

‘I will also apologise for losing control. B’Elanna, what just happened may have been mutual, but it can—’

‘—never happen again,’ B’Elanna finishes for her. ‘I know. And don’t worry, I’m not going to tell anyone.’

‘B’Elanna,’ Kathryn says, gently, after a moment, ‘I would never order you to keep this a secret.’

B’Elanna stares at her. ‘Seriously?’

‘Of course not. This is my personal life, but it’s yours, too. If you want to speak to your friends about it, then… it isn’t my place to prohibit you from doing so.’

‘That’s… thank you, Captain. I appreciate that. I probably won’t tell anyone, but I appreciate it.’

It strikes Kathryn then how ridiculous it is that B’Elanna has kissed her – is still kissing her in her memory, in the tingling, lingering pressure on her lips – and has never called her by her name. She bites her tongue on the urge to ask her to say it, to hear the syllables form in B’Elanna’s mouth. She forces her thoughts away from that particular cliff’s edge and straightens. They are still standing in her sonic shower stall, and she gestures to the showerhead, grasping for normalcy. ‘All finished?’ she asks.

B’Elanna has to pick her tricorder up off the shower floor, but she does so smoothly before she conducts a quick scan and nods. ‘Should be fine now; sonic and water readings both look good.’

‘Thank you,’ Kathryn says, smiling a genuine smile. ‘I’ve been desperate for a water shower, and I didn’t want to impose on Tuvok or Chakotay.’

‘You could have imposed on me,’ B’Elanna says, and then freezes. ‘I’m sorry, Captain, I don’t… I shouldn’t have said that.’

‘It’s all right,’ Kathryn murmurs, though it isn’t, really. It’s a red alert klaxon, bright and blaring in her mind, and it’s shouting temptation. On legs that are slowly regaining their solidity, she steps out of the shower and wordlessly leads B’Elanna back out through the bedroom and into the comparative safety of the living space. ‘Well,’ she says, when they’re standing by the door, too close together to be entirely professional, too far apart to fear a repeat of their earlier kiss. ‘I appreciate you making the house call.’

‘Any time,’ B’Elanna says.

‘And… thank you, B’Elanna. For your grace in handling this situation.’

‘Grace, huh.’ B’Elanna quirks an eyebrow. ‘No one’s ever said that about me before.’

Kathryn lets the corner of her mouth quirk up. ‘Then they weren’t paying attention.’

B’Elanna smiles at her, small but sweet, and something shifts and settles between them – understanding, perhaps, or the swell of the unknown ahead of them, or the blossoming possibility of something more, sooner or later. ‘Sweet dreams, Captain.’

‘Sweet dreams, B’Elanna. I’ll see you in the morning.’

B’Elanna leaves, casting one last look back at her as she goes, and then the doors close her out into the corridor. 

Later or sooner.


End file.
